Intercontinental Exchange Launches U.S. Treasury Index Family

ICE’s new benchmark indices selected by BlackRock to power four iShares^® U.S. Treasury ETFs

Intercontinental Exchange (NYSE: ICE), a leading operator of global exchanges, clearing houses and data services, announced today that its subsidiary, Interactive Data Pricing and Reference Data, LLC (Interactive Data), will become the new benchmark index provider for four of Blackrock’s iShares U.S. Treasury Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs): iShares 1-3 Year Treasury Bond ETF (SHY), iShares 3-7 Year Treasury Bond ETF (IEI), iShares 7-10 Year Treasury Bond ETF (IEF) and iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF (TLT). Known as the ICE U.S. Treasury Bond Index Series^TM, the indices will be operated by Interactive Data beginning in the second quarter of 2016.

Demand for fixed income data continues to increase, in part fueled by the growth in passive investment strategies through products such as ETFs. In 2015, bond ETFs grew at a 22% organic growth as more investors use ETFs to gain exposure to fixed income markets. BlackRock’s overall fixed income ETF business has $256 billion in global assets under management and offers investors a comprehensive range of options for low-cost access to the fixed income market.

“We are pleased to showcase the breadth and quality of our pricing and reference data through the creation of the ICE U.S. Treasury Bond Index Series^TM,” said Andrew Hausman, president of Pricing & Reference Data at Interactive Data. “Customers are increasingly relying on Interactive Data’s trusted evaluated pricing to support their risk and collateral management, benchmarking, and trading requirements.”

“Choosing Interactive Data as the new benchmark provider for four of our Treasury ETFs occurred after a thorough due diligence, testing and selection process,” said Ira Shapiro, Managing Director, BlackRock. “Their proven ability to provide high quality, independent, fixed-income evaluated pricing which we already use in our CoRI™ indices, together with their expertise in index design and calculation services were important factors in our decision.”

ICE U.S. Treasury Bond Index data including daily returns can be found on www.interactivedata.com/products-services/ice-indices, and the full set of index and constituent data can be licensed by contacting Interactive Data. Clients on BlackRock’s Aladdin^® and Interactive Data’s BondEdge^® platforms will also have access to the summary and constituent Index data.